


space in a spine of hills

by Addison R (beyond_belief)



Category: Shetland (TV)
Genre: Background Case, Families of Choice, M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-11
Updated: 2018-12-11
Packaged: 2019-09-13 17:35:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16896990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beyond_belief/pseuds/Addison%20R
Summary: Eight scenes about (or really, leading up to) one thing.





	space in a spine of hills

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dafna](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dafna/gifts).



> Happy holidays, dafna! I hope you enjoy. I love this series so much, and all the characters so much, probably more than I should for something that makes me cry whenever I re-watch the third season. Thanks to Ruth for being my go-to beta and person who has to listen to my yelling about Jimmy's face. 
> 
> Title is from Sheenagh Pugh, [three poems found here](http://theislandreview.com/content/three-shetland-poems-by-sheenagh-pugh), and all are lovely.
> 
> (ETA: This is set post-S4, ignoring S5 even happening.)

Jimmy doesn't say anything when he opens the door, just does that thing where he props his shoulder up against the doorframe a bit and gives Duncan that usual _I'm very fond of you but you're a massive fuck-up_ look, the one that still feels more gentle than judging, even when Duncan knows he's been a fuck-up.

"Could've used your key," Jimmy says once he's shut out the mist again. 

"Wanted to at least give you the opportunity to close the door in my face."

Jimmy chuckles dryly at that. "Room's still made up."

Duncan takes his boots off - they're wet and it's only polite - and his damp coat, and leaves it to dry. Jimmy goes back to the laptop and piles of paper on the table that should be for eating at, but has been mostly taken over by Jimmy's work since Cassie left for Edinburgh. Duncan puts his bag in Cassie's room and wipes the rain from his face and hands, then looks around the bedroom. It's the same as it was the last time he stayed over, that one night he had a few more than he should have and Mary was still cross with him for how he'd stood outside the clinic in Aberdeen when she'd already gone in; stood there and thought about leaving for a while before he'd straightened himself up and followed her inside.

The things Cassie left behind when she moved are still in boxes in the closet, and Jimmy put a more neutral set on the bed: cream with dark green stripes. There's still a few pictures stuck in the frame of the mirror. Cassie with some friends from Glasgow, Cassie with Fran. One of him and Jimmy from last year's Up Helly Aa, when Cassie'd been on her photography kick. The faces in all are smiling.

There's a sound from the kitchen as he hangs up his shirts, that hard clink of Jimmy readying his mug, probably for a coffee. "Should I make enough for two?" Jimmy calls.

"Yes, ta," Duncan answers, rounding the corner to see Jimmy take down another mug. 

"Don't even know what I'm making," Jimmy says lightly, and that same expression crosses his face again.

"Doesn't matter." Duncan gestures at the table. "Big case?"

"Housebreaking over Scalloway. Little things nicked, all in all a bit clumsy. Likely a local teenager or two."

"Aye, not much else to do in Scalloway," Duncan replies, and that gets an honest laugh out of Jimmy before he pours water over the grounds in the press. "Thanks for letting me stay. I'll keep out of your way."

"Don't recall you being in my way," Jimmy says easily. He fetches the pint of milk from the fridge as Duncan sits down in one of the tall chairs on the other side of the counter. "I've got pasta leftovers, if you're hungry."

"I'm fine." 

His phone rings; it's Maureen, who's still on duty at the hotel. _Work_ , he mouths at Jimmy's interested expression. "Hello, Maureen."

"There's a situation here, Duncan, you better come in," Maureen says, her voice tight with apprehension, and in the background of her words he can hear what sounds like someone crying. "And I think we might need the police. One of the guests seems to be missing."

"I'm with the Inspector right now. We'll be there in a few minutes." He ends the call and says to Jimmy, "Maureen's saying one of the guests might be missing, and I heard someone else having a cry off to the side."

"Right." Jimmy's already turning off the timer and heading for his boots. "Put your shoes on."

Duncan rolls his eyes, then takes his still-damp coat from the hook. "Yeah."

Ten minutes later, he's setting a mug of tea in front of a pale-faced guest who is huddled in a thick jumper at one of the small tables in the common room. It's late enough that the rest of the few people who've taken rooms for the night shouldn't wander through; for that he's grateful. Maureen is waiting off to one side, her arms wrapped around herself. 

Jimmy and Tosh don't seem inclined to ask him and Maureen to leave, so they stand nearby - Duncan shoves his hands in the pockets of his coat, feeling awkward - and answer the few questions about the ways in and out of the hotel that Jimmy asks. The guest, Polly, checked in yesterday on holiday with her friend, Greta. They had tea together rather late, then gone to their separate rooms to bathe before meeting Polly's room for a drink and some telly. Greta hadn't shown, and hadn't answered Polly's knocks on her door, or her mobile. 

"We were supposed to go to Unst tomorrow," Polly is telling Jimmy, "to see the longhouses there. Greta was looking forward to it, she wouldn't simply _leave_."

"I saw them walk through earlier, on their way to the dining room," Maureen says, pitched for Duncan's ears. "But not again after that."

"I'm sure she's just lost her way in the dark," Duncan murmurs in reply, doing his best to sound reassuring, although he knows there are few reasons for someone here on holiday to go out this late in the cold, especially when they'd made other plans. 

"Duncan, why don't you show me where Greta's staying?" Jimmy says, as Polly wipes her face with some tissues. "Polly, Sgt. McIntosh will stay here with you, and if we have any questions for you about Greta's room, someone will come down for you."

Polly nods, clearly needing a moment to pull herself together. 

Up the stairs and down the hall, Duncan unlocks the door of Greta's room and lets Jimmy open it; stands in the hallway as Jimmy goes in. "Does anything look out of place that you can tell, furniture not where it should be?" Jimmy asks.

It's not a large room, and after a year and a half of owning the hotel, Duncan knows how everything is supposed to look. This room looks as though everything's in the right place. There's a suitcase open on the chair, not rummaged through, items still folded neatly. 

"This is how it usually looks, minus the suitcase and shoes there."

Jimmy nods. He takes several pictures on his mobile, then has Duncan secure the door. "How many rooms here?"

"Eight total. Six of them are taken tonight." This hallway is quiet except for the dimmest murmur of someone's telly, and Duncan points at the two other rooms rented out for the night, one of which is Polly's. "The three upstairs are working for the construction project in Skellister, I think. Two men and one woman, they've been here three or four days now."

"We'll have to talk to them. You have cameras?"

"One that's only aimed at the front desk, it doesnae cover the rest of the lobby." Duncan points at the mount as they pass it on the stairs. "Records to a DVD. You can have at it if you think it might help."

"I'll have Billy go through it just to be safe."

Polly looks a bit more composed when they round the corner. Jimmy presses his car key into Duncan's hand, then leans in and says close to Duncan's ear, "I'll probably be late, so I'll have Tosh drop me off. You take the car back." 

Duncan sees Tosh's eyes widen slightly, and she raises her eyebrows at him quickly before schooling her expression back to neutral. Just for her benefit, he says, "Guess I'll clean up that coffee."

*

He doesn't mean to wait in the living room until Jimmy gets back; intending to go straight into the bedroom and get some sleep before having to deal with whatever happens tomorrow. But Duncan just stares up at the ceiling for an hour before rolling out from under the blanket and going back into the living room. Only the light over the stove is on, but it's enough to see by.

He stretches out on the sofa and thinks about the hotel, any places Greta might have slipped into and hid, but he knows the place like the back of his hand by now and between the police and his employees, all those places have likely been checked. 

He goes through them anyway. Then his mind switches to Mary's face when they'd gotten the news, and the cold knowledge running through him that it was all over. _I dinnae know you wanted this so badly_ , he'd thought about saying. 

He hadn't said it, though. He hadn't said anything. 

There's the sound of boots on pavement, then keys in the lock. Jimmy asks, "Were you waiting for me?", his voice from somewhere else in the house.

"Cannae sleep," Duncan replies, the words twisted by a yawn. "Keep thinking -"

"Thoughts like that'll keep you awake forever if you let them," Jimmy interrupts, and Duncan hears footsteps as he approaches. 

"At least your furniture is comfortable." The beginning of a headache is starting to pulse at the base of his skull; he's not young, he can't go all night on only coffee and willpower anymore. He squints upward and sees Jimmy standing there at the back of the sofa, pale hair and face visible above the dark of his jumper. Duncan's a bit jolted to realize Jimmy looking somewhat haggard is a sight he's grown used to. "You did come back to catch a wee bit of sleep, right?"

"Some. We can't do much of a search at this hour, though there's a few volunteers out."

Duncan knows that Jimmy means the handful of old-timers who could walk the island with a blindfold. He reaches up to rub his neck right where the headache is gathering. "There was nothing else at the hotel?"

"No. For now, we're calling it a missing persons."

"You'll let me know if there's anything else I can do," Duncan says, a statement more than a question.

"Yeah." Jimmy turns, and in the limited light from the kitchen, Duncan sees the outline of him pulling his sweater over his head. "Get off my sofa and go to bed," Jimmy says over his shoulder, before the sound of his footsteps fades away up the stairs. 

*  
*

"I could move out, take a room in the hotel," Duncan offers.

Jimmy doesn't look up from his computer. "Don't be stupid. You've already brought over two-thirds of the shirts you own, you might as well pick up the rest if Mary lets you in the house."

Duncan's used to Jimmy's barbs - they're nothing if not good at needling one another - but Jimmy must look up at just the right moment to catch the expression he tries to blank out, and his pale gaze holds Duncan's. "Duncan. What happened?"

Duncan's glad for the bottle of wine he's opening, because peeling off the foil around the top gives his hands something to do. "Remember how I told you about Mary and I trying for a baby, quite a while ago now," he says. The foil comes off in a long ribbon.

"Aye, I remember."

"Turns out it was never going to happen, not without all sorts of help. Saw a specialist in Aberdeen." He puts the foil in the bin, then looks at Jimmy, who's frowning slightly. "Stop giving me that look, all right? Mary's made up her mind this time. Since all that with Alan, it's been..."

He pauses, works the cork out of the bottle. "She never looked at me quite the same after that, you know? No matter what she said, I could tell. It's funny, eh? Two kids I wasn't there for, and then this news. And before you try to say it - everything that's good in Cassie, that's you and Frannie. None of it's me." 

"Well, she had to have got the rebellious streak from somewhere," Jimmy says dryly, a very obvious tease. 

"All Frannie," Duncan insists with a laugh he has to force. 

Jimmy's face sobers. "I'm sorry, Duncan," he says quietly. "That's - difficult all around."

Duncan remembers Fran's careful comments about Jimmy's first wife, years ago, when Cassie was still small and Fran was still vibrant, during one of his visits to Glasgow. "I didn't think families were so confusing," she'd said, gesturing to the two of them and to the view of Jimmy and Cassie playing outside, "until all of this."

Now he takes two glasses from the rack and pours himself and Jimmy each a glass of wine, and walks over to the table. He presses the one glass into Jimmy's hand until Jimmy takes it. "It's only a few swallows in there, I know you're always on duty."

"Changing the subject." 

"Aye." He glances at Jimmy's piles of paperwork. "Any headway?"

Jimmy leans back, frowning at the maps and printouts. "To be honest, it's as though Greta Tolliver's vanished into thin air."

"No one vanishes into thin air," Duncan replies, taking the free chair at the table.

"That's exactly what I said to Sandy this afternoon." Jimmy sighs. "Her friend Polly insists Greta said she saw a ghost, through the window in her room at the hotel, and that after that, Greta would hardly talk. And that night she disappeared."

"You think my hotel's haunted?"

"I think she could have seen any number of things. Someone's shadow. Fulmars. The wind whipping through the grasses." He lifts a shoulder. "Maybe only the fog." 

"I wouldn't expect any of those to scare a person into silence," Duncan says, picturing the view of the cliffs from the window of that room, "but when the weather's nasty, I suppose you could see all sorts of things in that particular frame."

Jimmy takes a swallow from his glass, then says, "I don't think your hotel is haunted."

Duncan fixes him with a look. "Really, Jimmy."

Jimmy smiles at that, but then his phone starts to ring, so Duncan claps him lightly on the shoulder and leaves him to it. 

*

"Don't think your heart's in it tonight, Duncan," Anders says, as Duncan loses yet another hand, and another ten pounds. 

Anders isn't wrong; Duncan should be focused on the cards and the group's slow and meandering conversation about this week's rumours, but he can't get past the thought of Greta Tolliver following some errant shadow out of the hotel, only to go over the edge of the cliff in the darkness. He knows this part of the island as well as he knows anything, never thought about how desolate and frightening it might be to an outsider in the pitch-black, with the wind whipping the grasses harshly against a person, the rain cold and gusting so hard it nearly suffocates. 

The thought makes him nearly choke on his own breath, and he puts his cards down. "I fold, fellas," he says, voice rough to his own ears. "No concentration tonight."

"You thinking about that disappeared woman?" Martin asks, scratching a hand through his beard, and Duncan nods. "Aye. Hard not to."

Heads bob around the table. Duncan pulls his coat on, feeling like he'd only just taken it off. "Ring me with next week's plans, okay?" he tells Martin, who nods. Everyone's focus has already turned back to the cards, so it's nothing for Duncan to leave without any departing words. 

Outside the pub, the air is thick with the cold mist, and he turns up his collar and starts for Jimmy's. He can taste the salt in the air tonight. Up the street, headlights flash at him, and a Volvo pulls over. "Thought that was you," Jimmy calls out the window, and Duncan feels his mouth twitch in a smile as he slides into the passenger seat.

"Poker night wrap up early?" Jimmy asks.

"More like I quit early. You just leaving the station?"

"Aye."

What Duncan can see of Jimmy's face in the flash of streetlamps looks tired - more tired than usual. "You okay?"

"Aye," Jimmy says, but in that hedging way he's got. 

Duncan's had enough beer that saying, "Och, but you're lying to me, Jimmy," seems a good thing to do.

"Maybe." Jimmy pulls the car over to the place he usually parks it and stops, but doesn't turn off the engine. 

"This feels like I'm about to get lectured for staying out late gambling," Duncan says after a moment of silence. 

Jimmy chuckles at that. "No, no."

"Good, because I was having a shitty night at the table, and don't need reminding." In the dark of the car, he feels alright adding, "Cannae stop thinking about that missing woman, you know? That she might have walked out of my hotel and right off the cliffs."

"She wouldn't be the first," Jimmy says softly. He turns off the car. "Come on, let's get inside and have a drink."

Jimmy's idea of a drink is a splash of whiskey for him, and at least twice that for Duncan. 

"Did something happen?" Duncan asks, as Jimmy slides the glass over. "You've got that look."

"We found a coat, tangled up against some brush. Polly's identified it as belonging to Greta, and it's gone to Aberdeen for the forensics lab there to see what they can find."

Duncan knows as well as anyone that the coat could mean nothing. Jimmy stares down at his whisky for a moment, then takes a measured sip; Duncan can see just how careful it is. "Nothing's turned up yet with the Coast Guard search," Jimmy says. 

Duncan also knows as well as anyone that enough time has passed that a body should have washed ashore by now, were a body going to wash ashore. "Well, that could be good, and that could be bad," he replies, after swirling the whiskey around in his glass for a few seconds. 

"Yeah."

"What about the CCTV?"

"Checked everything in that time frame." Jimmy tips his head and Duncan hears the dim pop of vertebrae. "Least we know where she didn't go."

The mood at the hotel today had been sombre. Duncan was in and out all day fetching deliveries from the dock and running other errands, but Maureen had cornered him, concerned about Polly sitting in the common area, watching out the window.

"How much longer have you asked Polly to stay in Lerwick?" he asks Jimmy now.

Jimmy looks up at that. "We haven't. She told Tosh that she wouldn't feel right leaving until we know what happened to Greta. It's not causing some hardship for the hotel, is it?"

"No. Maureen's just worried for her, she spent most of the day looking out the window, like she's watching for her friend." He slides into one of the tall chairs, frowns down at his glass. "Is there - Greta's likely dead, isn't she."

"Between us… the most likely outcome of this is that we find her body," Jimmy says, leaning on his elbows on the other side of the counter, glass cradled between his hands. "But until that time, it will continue to be a missing persons case."

Duncan feels alright about reaching over and resting his hand on Jimmy's arm below the elbow. Jimmy looks down at the touch, but doesn't move away.

*  
*

Duncan gets back to the house to find Jimmy standing in the kitchen, his hands resting on the counter, and not moving. Duncan curves a hand over his shoulder and squeezes. "You alright?"

"Aye, just thinking," Jimmy says, but doesn't move for another few seconds. Then he turns around and crosses his arms loosely over his chest. "Greta's mobile turned up today. Out of battery, but not bricked."

"Anything that might shed some light on what happened to her?"

"Sandy's still reading through all the old messages. Polly's still at the hotel, yeah?"

Duncan nods. "Her husband arrived this afternoon, flew over from Glasgow. He seems an alright chap but I did hear them having a bit of a back and forth as to why she doesn't want to leave yet."

"Tosh and I will talk to him tomorrow." Jimmy rubs at his chin, frowning. He hasn't shaved in a day or two, and he looks tired. 

Duncan raises his hands and reaches out, trying to indicate clearly what his intentions are, and Jimmy sighs and steps in. Duncan curves one hand around the back of his neck and slides his arm around Jimmy's waist. He feels Jimmy's sigh more than he feels it, and Jimmy relaxes against him. 

Duncan does his best not to let his surprise show at that, just because it's so unexpected. He hugs Jimmy a little tighter. "Christ, man, when was the last time someone touched you?"

"Hugged Cass at the airport," Jimmy replies, muffled against Duncan's shoulder. "A month ago."

Duncan lets his incredulous noise escape; he feels it's warranted. "A month ago," he echoes in a mutter, solely to convey his displeasure.

"It's fine."

He cups the back of Jimmy's neck and squeezes gently, decidedly not saying _It's not fine_ , even though he knows he's not the only one to tell Jimmy over the last few years that he ought to rejoin the human race, that having the few relationships he's tried since Fran all spoil doesn't mean that he, James, is ruined. 

"Y'can let go, I'm fine," Jimmy grumbles after another few seconds, but his arms are still around Duncan as well. 

"Think you can stand it a minute more." 

That makes Jimmy laugh, his chest hitching against Duncan's. "What would I do without you to bully me into some physical contact every now and again?" 

Duncan feels justified in tapping him - lightly - on the back of the head, muttering, "Show you a bully, Jimmy Perez," and Jimmy laughs again and squeezes him very tightly around the middle before untangling himself from Duncan. 

"See, that wasnae all bad," Duncan says before he even thinks about it, the color in Jimmy's cheeks and the smile pulling at his mouth inspiring Duncan to opine all sorts of things. He feels his own face start to pink, so he clears his throat and tries to make his expression normal again. "Going back to the station yet tonight?"

"Aye, still some things to go over." 

"Well, I was going to make up a sandwich or two, you can take one with you," Duncan says, in his firmest voice. 

Which must not be that firm, because Jimmy makes a disbelieving noise before he says, "Aye, okay," and rubs his hands over his face. 

"You sleep last night?" Duncan asks as he scrapes some butter onto slices of bread.

Jimmy's small sound tells him mostly what he needs to know. "I dinnae hear you come home even," Duncan adds pointedly.

"I did! Late. You must have been dead to the world." Jimmy's phone rings, and he picks it up from the counter. "Tosh, what have you got?" Duncan hears him ask, even as he goes after his boots.

Quickly, Duncan slaps down the ham and cheese, wraps the whole thing up in paper, and chucks it at Jimmy once he's off the call. "I'm no chef but at least you'll not starve."

Jimmy says something in reply, but the words are lost to the heavy fabric of his coat as he pulls it on, then Duncan hears the squeak and click of the door. He goes back to making his own sandwich, finds a random footie match on the telly for noise. 

His phone beeps with a text ten minutes later. It's from Jimmy: _ta_

Duncan snorts and dusts off the crumbs, then goes to see what lager's left in the fridge.

*  
*

Duncan's in the tiny hotel office doing the ordering when Jimmy and Tosh arrive to speak with Polly's husband. "D'you think she'll go home after this?" Maureen asks, leaning against the wall right next to the door, since there's not really much place else to go in the small space. "Feels like it's been forever and it's only been a week."

"Aye," Duncan agrees, putting down his paperwork.

"Lived on Shetland my whole life and know what the cliffs are like, but still." She shakes her head. "That Jimmy Perez doesn't tell you the details?"

"No, why would he?" Duncan asks mildly, rifling through a different sheaf of order forms in an effort to pretend he's not bothered by the question, just to see where Maureen is going with this.

"Well, you're under the same roof there, yeah?"

He does look up at that. Maureen raises her hands, smirking. "I dinnae say under the same sheets, don't you make that face!"

"You're lucky I've known you twenty years," Duncan says. "And it's his job if he talks about things he shouldn't, if you catch my meaning."

"Aye, aye," she replies, chuckling. 

He makes a shooing motion. "Go find something to do besides pick on me, eh?"

"Och, where's the fun there," Maureen laughs, but holds out her hand for the post, which Duncan passes over. 

Voices raise in the lobby a few minutes after Maureen's gone, and Duncan leans out the doorway to see Polly and her husband arguing. "I don't see why you have to _stay_ ," the husband - Duncan can't recall his name - says, loudly, yanking on his coat so quick and harsh that the sleeve gets tangled. "They said you can leave! It's right creepy around here, Polly!"

"Aren't you worried about Greta?" Polly asks, her voice slightly softer than her husband's, and she grabs at his arm. "We've been friends since Uni, all of us, and you're not upset she's disappeared?"

"Oh, come off it, Polly. You know as well as I that she's likely used this to run off with that Norwegian. Left her coat and mobile to make it look like she's drowned."

"What are you even on about? She told me weeks ago that she hasn't seen him in months, and besides, I'm her best friend, we -"

Duncan slides back into the office and grabs his own mobile, texts Jimmy. _better come back, can hear P & husband arguing, sounds like they didn't tell you all of it_

 _on our way_ , Jimmy replies, and five minutes later, Duncan hears the car roll up onto the gravel.

*

"I suppose since you overheard most if it, I can tell you," Jimmy says later. He's spooning rice from a takeaway container, not looking at Duncan as he talks. "The Norwegian that Charles Wilson mentioned is a man that Greta worked with at the museum, for several months from the sound of it. Curating some sort of textiles exhibition. Billy's looking at CCTV for someone matching his description, and we're checking with the ferries, see if he was in Lerwick."

Duncan undoes the lid on the curry. "So maybe Greta slipped away in the dead of night, made it look like she drowned, to be with this man?"

"It is… something we're pursuing, yes."

Duncan whistles, low under his breath. "Not a nice way to leave your friends, letting Polly just twist in the wind, eh?"

"Not nice at all." Jimmy hands him a fork. "Cass is supposed to call in a bit."

"So this is you telling me to eat quickly."

"Didn't say that," Jimmy replies with a smile, and pushes one of the plates toward Duncan.

Cassie doesn't call until they've finished and done the washing, and Duncan's put the kettle on for tea. Jimmy stays in the kitchen, so clearly he doesn't care about Duncan listening in on his side of the conversation. 

"Calculus, that sounds - a bit beyond me, to be honest, honey," Jimmy says, widening his eyes slightly at Duncan as if to express how he feels about maths. "What about that literature class?... Uh-huh."

Duncan chuckles at that all and rinses out his mug, gets another one off the shelf for Jimmy just in time for the kettle to whistle.

"You can ask him yourself in a minute, he's standing right here," Jimmy says to Cass.

Whatever it is she says in reply, Duncan can't hear, but Jimmy's slightly admonishing "Cassie, honestly," is enough to make him look over, and catch Jimmy's gaze. He sees Jimmy's face flush, Jimmy's gaze flick up and down Duncan's body, making him run as hot as he's sure the skin of Jimmy's cheeks would feel if Duncan pressed the back of his hand there. 

_Oh._ Duncan finds he's startled, his pulse suddenly thrumming. Jimmy's still looking at him, and part of Duncan wants to look away but can't, all on top of the utter strangeness of Jimmy being on the phone with their daughter at the same time as Duncan thinking to himself that maybe Jimmy'd let Duncan take him to bed. 

Who is he kidding, Jimmy doesn't _let_ anyone do anything. 

Duncan puts the milk back in the refrigerator and stirs both his tea and Jimmy's, aware of Jimmy's eyes on him. He moves in slightly, just a little closer to Jimmy than he'd normally stand. "Hi, Cass," he says, leaning in towards Jimmy's phone, and hears her bright laughter. Jimmy huffs a short laugh and affects pushing him away, but really only rests his palm on Duncan's chest. 

"No, I only let him come over so he can make something awful to eat," Jimmy says to Cassie. "Your father is not a deft hand in the kitchen."

"I cook," Duncan insists, but it's mostly a bluff. He leans in again. "Don't let him fool you, we got a takeaway."

Whatever Cassie says at that, he can't make it out, but Jimmy smiles and his face goes soft. "Aye, okay, but seriously, honey - mind your own business."

Duncan can't stop his laughter at that, as Jimmy puts the phone down, but it stops in his throat as Jimmy's light hand still on his chest turns into Jimmy getting a fistful of Duncan's shirt. "Just - don't talk," Jimmy grumbles, and then he's kissing Duncan firmly. 

It's a bit awkward, jammed up against the counter, Jimmy's knuckles pressing into Duncan's chest, that they'd both eaten a curry spiced with garlic. But it's also more familiar than Duncan thinks it has any right to be, like Jimmy hasn't changed his cologne in fifteen years, and in the back of his head Duncan can hear Fran's voice. She'd smiled at him from where she was standing behind Jimmy with her arms looped around Jimmy's waist. And Jimmy too drunk to keep a straight face for once, smiling as Fran held one hand out to Duncan, _Come on and dance with us, darling._

Jimmy inhales quickly, pulling away, and Duncan figures he's not the only one remembering. He rests his forehead against Jimmy's. "Been a while, eh?"

Jimmy gives him that look and presses his whole body against Duncan's. "Since?"

Duncan waves a hand up and down, indicating _this_. Then he cups a hand around the back of Jimmy's skull and kisses him again.

*  
*

"You know this is mad," Duncan says, when Jimmy gets back the house the following night, bringing with him another whirl of cold, wet air. Duncan's sitting at the counter, going over some building plans with glass of whisky in hand. It's late and rain is pelting the steep roof, but Duncan's stolen Jimmy's house shoes and lit a fire, so it's cozy inside.

"Aye," Jimmy agrees peaceably, then adds, "What is it that's mad?".

"Half the island thinks we're shacking up, if not more."

Jimmy puts his coat up, chuckling. "Aye, you did officially move in."

"I dinnae mean like -"

"I know what you meant," Jimmy says, stealing the glass from Duncan's hand and taking a sip, then seeming to hesitate for a moment before leaning in for a kiss. It's brief, but Duncan thinks nothing of following Jimmy's mouth with his own after that, gently pulling him in closer by the collar of his jumper. 

"This looks like work, but you're in pyjamas already," Jimmy murmurs, thumb stroking warm over Duncan's neck. 

"Aye, was only waiting for you to get in before I went to sleep. Had to be over in Sandness early this morning to meet with the guy matching some textiles for those new holiday lets, said it was the only time he had free, then ended up hiking all over God's creation looking at properties for sale on that side of the island."

"Guessing that left you in a state somewhat less than warm and dry."

"Yeah, I was a bit cross with everyone and everything by the end of it," Duncan admits.

Jimmy smiles at that, before he finishes off the whisky and says, "I would imagine. Now do you want to hear the news, or complain some more about how Maureen thinks we're fucking?"

"How'd you know it was Maureen taking the piss out of me?" Duncan asks, then feels his insides freeze up a bit, even with the drink and the fire going. "Please don't tell me Cassie's knocked up."

A look close to shell-shocked crosses Jimmy's face. "Oh, Christ, we're not old enough for that. No, no, not about Cass. About Greta Tolliver."

"She turn up, then?"

"Oh, she turned up. In a hotel in Stavanger." Jimmy reaches for the nearby bottle without moving much away from Duncan, pours another two fingers into the glass. 

"Well, don't leave me hanging, man, out with the details," Duncan insists. "Alive, eh?"

"She and her Norwegian friend were engaging in that most life-affirming of acts when the hotel manager unlocked the door for the police," Jimmy replies, his lips curving in a smile around the rim of the glass. 

Duncan smothers a laugh into his hand. "Christ."

Jimmy takes another swallow, then passes Duncan the glass before going to the fireplace and carefully tamping out the fire. Duncan's in warm pyjamas, but immediately misses the heat of Jimmy leaning against his side. He looks down at the whisky remaining for a moment, then asks, "You don't really think snogging me last night was mad, do you?"

"No," Jimmy says, mostly to the fireplace. "Why?"

He finishes off the drink and stands up, then goes to the sink to rinse out the glass, along with the mug he'd left there. "I don't exactly have the best track record."

"Don't I know it," Jimmy replies, and Duncan turns to see Jimmy standing with his arms crossed, gaze locked on Duncan. "Yet I still kissed you, after our daughter - _our own daughter_ \- asked if I'd made an honest man of you yet."

Duncan says, "Och, she doesn't know me at all," solely to see Jimmy's serious expression collapse into a quiet mirth. "And that's moving a bit quick, yeah?"

Jimmy rubs a hand over his cheek, still looking amused. "How about we take things one day at a time? And not tell Cassie. Until -" he makes a vague forward gesture, "a bit later."

Duncan nods at that, drying his wet hands on the tea towel. The sound of the water against the walls outside seems loud for a moment. It's followed by a piercing whistle of wind, and the door rattles once in its frame. 

"All right, I'm going up," Jimmy says. "You can share, if that's not moving too quick, and it's warmer with two."

"Aye," Duncan agrees, and follows Jimmy up the stairs.


End file.
